Introduction:

Medicine is as much as an art as it is a science. Today the allopathic physicians are time strapped and do not treat the patients as a complete holistic entity –THE MIND, BODY AND SOUL. 

Physician factors:

It is time that allopathic physicians should look within and deeply introspect. Very often their own attitudes and behaviors contribute to difficult encounters with patients.

Many allopathic physicians can be:

• Angry or overtly defensive
• Physicians can sometimes experience a burn out. They can get stressed and generally frustrated react negatively to patients.
• Fatigued or Harried Physicians
• Physicians can be overworked and sleep deprived.
• Dogmatic or Arrogant Physicians. Some physicians are dismissive about diet and Alternate therapies because of their own personal prejudices.
• Some physicians have strong personal beliefs and values, which prevent them from providing us with adequate information about their care.
• Language problems and difficulty in communicating with patients due to a lack of a proper interpreter.
•  Multiple persons in the Exam Room can sometimes unnerve physicians. 

Patients can also be at fault:

Often, the time strapped allopathic physician encounter several difficult varieties of patients like:

• Angry, Defensive, Frightened or Resistant Patients
• Manipulative Patients who love to play on the guilt of others, threatening rage, legal action or suicide
• Somatizing Patients who present with a chronic course of multiple vague or exaggerated symptoms and often suffer from co-morbid anxiety, depression and personality disorders. They often have a history of multiple diagnostic tests.
• Grieving Patients
• Embarrassed patients who may be lonely, dependent or too afraid or embarrassed to ask the questions they really want answered. They may also be patients with a large number of perfectly sane questions.

Conclusion:
 
More and more patients are seeking the help of a Holistic physician because a Holistic MD will at first function like any other orthodox specialist.  He will take a detailed history and do a clinical examination, such as pulse, BP and a complete physical examination.  Then he will perform the diagnostic blood tests that any MD normally does.  The initial work up may last more than an hour and this helps both the physician and the patient to understand each other and develop trust for one another.
 

When a patient chooses a Holistic physician, he or she has the option of trying natural complementary therapies in tandem with the allopathic treatment and this helps in elimination of the toxins in the patient and leads him to a complete and comprehensive holistic cure.

Patients with intractable health issues often search for a physician because they believe in the power of the body to heal itself, but they also recognize the need a physician who can prescribe drugs if needed.

Other patients seek holistic cures because they have exhausted all the options of conventional medicine.  A holistic physician will be able to factor past therapies and then initiate a new health regimen to help patients improve their health through orthodox and alternative means.